St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1887-05-05
aiming by, brimmed and


And began to hate the river-the
river that had used to love so in the
sunshine, all blue and silver; that
had loved so, dimpling in its soft gray'
in rainy weather; where | had never
tired of seeing the ice- boats dart along
when it lay white under it's wintry
mail-the river that now, in my griet
and trouble and WEAKNESS, flowed pas
as calmly as if l had never seen it
How could it be SO irrespOnsive, roll
ing on bright and strong and steady
giving me back no sympathy now in
my sorrowful mood, giving me even nc
vantage ground f-for | should have
had to wade into it if | had wanted to
drown myself. Yes, | began to hate
the river. | began to hate, too, these
long, tiresOme, mOtiOnless levels of the
grass lands-Oh, so fat, so monOto-
nous, so low fOne is simply under
ground here" said to myself. zone
has really not the air to breathe. One
becomes like these slugs that live I'M
der the damp side of IA stone. l am
under stone myself. Oh, for just a
breath of air from some point a little
way up the sky!" | began to hate, |
say, the long green grass fields; and
then l began to hate the farm life. at
is dull, sordid, base work, let them say
what they please" | said, "frOm the
pitching about of the barn-yard muck
to the last results of it. 1t is all nom
sense about its being the one noble Oc
cupation. So is the cooks, then, too"
Aud | hated the great cattle in the
yard, the smell of the frOthing pals OF
milk, the click of the stanchions, the
cheese making, the butter packing
everything that belonged to all the
dull round of the farm duties. | went
about to see the work done, and said a
word to the maids here, the men there;
and | went and sat down by kindling
autumn fire, and felt that if | had to
live here forever, | had better die and
be done with it. had rather die and
be done with it anyway, if | was new
Ell to see Mark any more ; but then
that was no new feeling.
Do what would, my thoughts would
follow Mark. Was he there alone i'll
his fathers house7 Was he riding
gayly round the country, visiting 9th
er houses, other girls happier than |,
hearing music, joining in laughter
Or was he travelling off in distant re-
gions, seeing new sights and forgetting
the old, forgetting the past and me in
fresh experiences Or was he sitting
at home there in the long dim room
whose windows looked through the
pine wood vista over the broad valley
and away to blue mountains? No one
told me no one ever ventured to men
ton his name to me. But somehow |
placed him there in the long dim room,
and there my fancy kept following him
and lowering about him. Now he sat
10y the fireside there, in the deep chair,
reading; now he was busy with maps
and pictures at the table now, i'll the
big bay, the moonlight, that had pale
green reflections in it cast up from the
emeral depths of the woods below, fell
about him. | dare say that, in reality,
busy about the place and his affairs of
one sort or another, and doing his best
to live and to forget, he was very little
in that room but there chose to place
him and it grew strangely sweet to
me, and every moment when could
sit down alone my fancy took me and
| sat down in that room, or else wan
dered up and down the great staircase
and the hall were his peoples pOr-
traits hung; but | always came back
again to the hearth of the long dim
room if it were day, to the dancing
fre-cast shadows there if it were night:
and the place grew dearer and dearer
to me every hour, and L upbralded
myself i'm thoughts too bitter for speech
for the folly and angry temper that had
shut me out of it, that had drawn COM
parison between that ancient lofty
place and this low and tiresOme stretch
of nothing but common grass lands,
between that manor and this plain
farm house, although in real truth my
farm house was quite it's equal at any
other time. But the new year came in
without sign from Mark or a sign
from me !; and the country was white
with snow, and the river ice was
strong enough 10 bear up sledges and
teams of horses, and the ebOats
went splitting the wind before them.
1t all made no odds to me. | was com
pletely wretched. L didn't pretend to
go to church or to any society meet
ings and if the Sawyers and Wellses
came to me, | suppose [ treated them
properly-I'm sure | don't knOw-but
| never set my foot out doors the win
ter long.
There were furious storms that win
ter. The snow fell as | never remem
bered it before. The drifts seemed to
wall us in from all the world. GA liv
ing tomb" | used to murmur. 81 wish
it we're tomb indeed, and L in my
last sleep" At twenty, one can be so
very miserable f; and at thirty, if one
lives so long, one can be so prOfane as
to laugh at it.
Sometimes Bryan and Thomas
brought word of the outside regions,
of the way people up-river were sleigh
riding over the tops of fences, of the
immense snow fall in the mountains,
and the fears of what would happen I
from it in the spring if there should be |
an early thaw. And | remembered
some words that Mark used to quote
from play he had seen, "When this
snow melteth there shall come flood"
| didn't care how many floods came.
And so, with storm after storm, the
winter wore away, Jane and Maria at
their home keeping tasks, aud | busy
with my ug-making, hooking strips
of wooden cloth through coffee bags,
not because the house was not full of
them, but because had nothing bet
ter to do. For | couldn't read; if |
tried, my eyes swan, and | could not
make out word of what it was all
about. And people went and came
like shadows and the days had grown
short, and now they grew long, and
what did it all matter to meq
March had come, but without a sign
of the winters breaking and then at
last April lOitered on, and April suns
began to do their work and gradual
" the drifts of snow in the lanes and
in the fields began to settle, and to
lessen and melt and disappear. And
Bryan and Thomas had to talk of the